Human/machine interfacing is a constantly evolving field, given the physical limitations of humans as controlled by our senses or taste, touch, smell, sight, hearing, temperature, balance, vibration, kinetic movement, and sound, with the accompanying restraints on each of these senses-such as visual acuity for focus and distance, range of temperature sensing ability, frequency and amplitude limits on hearing, bounded range of olfactory detection, touch range limit of lower end detectability to higher threshold of pain, taste limits, strength and speed of human limb movements, and so on.
Thus the human machine interface must operate within these senses and their related limits, wherein this science is termed “User Interface” (UI). The UI can be broken down into evolutionary categories such as Batch Interface—this was an early computer interface that was for the convenience of the computer and not the human—wherein a group of batch of data (i.e. punch cards or punched tape) were created and organized for a batch input to the computer resulting in no live interaction as between the human and computer at all, with events happening in a longer term series timeline, i.e. batch in, computer processing, and batch output, i.e. turn in your punched cards and come back tomorrow for your output being common.
Subsequent to this, UI evolved into a command line interface which is where a human would input specialized line text which had the big advantage of more of a “real time” human/machine interface, than the batch system, however, a significant drawback was the memory burden on the human for the specialized text that they had to know, thus failing the intuitive and easy to learn goals as desired features of UI. Examples of command line interface were teletype machines and early computer video display terminals.
The next evolution of UI was a text based user interface or otherwise known as “drop down menus” that allowed for more of a standardized group of computer commands and greatly reduced the undesirable issues of memory burden that the command line interface had, thus resulting in quicker and easier learning of computer commands by the human.
Continuing, UI has morphed into the “graphical user interface” which brought in the mouse, multiple windows, pointers, and the like, thus the graphical user interface separated the series text command input into single point and click command based on a graphical icon, which further increased the intuitive human learning curve plus eliminated language barriers as a graphic icon is universally understood worldwide irrelevant to the human user's language. As an example instead of typing the command to “print” or even finding the drop down menu that contained the “print” command, all a human user had to do was point and click to the printer graphical icon, thus resulting in an even faster and easier to use UI for the computer.
Fast forwarding to modern times, the UI has another challenge in the move toward mobile computing, as the aforementioned ability to type in text, use drop down menus, and point and click with a mouse are substantially eliminated, as the human in having a portable and mobile device does not easily have the traditional UI human input devices such as a mouse or keyboard leaving other human sense UI input capabilities of or taste, touch, smell, sight, hearing, temperature, balance, vibration, kinetic movement, and sound, that have to be utilized in new and different ways than before for specific desired commands to the mobile computer.
Eliminating the mouse and keyboard has led to the touch screen interface, both in the tactile and haptic type, wherein the haptic type has seemed to become the most popular as haptic means creating the sense of touch (that would have been via a keyboard button depression in the past), through other means such as vibration, forces, motions, or even visual feedback to the human user, this is as opposed to tactile touch screens that utilized a “soft” screen for the user to sense a slight depression movement when touching the screen for touch screen feedback, however, with the currently popular “hard” touch screen, i.e. there is no touch screen depression based on touch, haptic feedback is the norm.
The popularity of the hard touch screen is based on its ability to more quickly and accurately respond to touch screen commands, plus the ability to have smaller icons to touch screen on allowing for a wider diversity of commands allowed for a given touch screen size as compared to tactile touch screens that require larger screen icons and work slower for fast paced multiple screen touch commands.
Tactile touch screens typically use a resistive system that actuates via physical depression (the advantage being anything (any material) can make the force depression). The hard touch screen typically works via a capacitive system (requiring an electrically conductive contact—that's why they don't work with gloves on your hand) that can sense capacitive charge change when touched or a surface acoustic wave system (that doesn't require a conductive contact) that senses wave disruption when touched. Voice recognition command has also played a part in UI without again the mouse and keyboard, however, having limitations in working in noisy environments plus the inability to work in quiet environments wherein the human user cannot speak freely, plus additional limitations in the accuracy of voice to desired command output.
In looking at a specific class of mobile devices such as in sports applications wherein the human user is being active and typically has on special attire (such as gloves for skiing), the ability for the human user to utilize a touch screen in not possible for several reasons, being that gloves prevent any sort of accurate useful touch screen activity and under the concept of “least astonishment” the human user in a sports activity cannot hardly pay any attention to their commands other than a very momentary action—and certainly not having the ability to focus and look at a screen for information or feedback, also display screens are of little use in bright sunlight outdoor environments. Thus in sports device applications the UI needs to focus upon selected movement commands that do not require any contact, i.e. selected movements that require minimal attention to achieve the desired outputs from the mobile device.
In general desirable qualities in a UI system include;
a. Clarity—simple and straightforward
b. Distinction—logical separation of different commands
c. Intuitive—easy to learn and remember
d. Responsiveness—fast and definite command outputs
e. Consistency—a selected command results in a specific desired output
f. Reliability—low maintenance and low failures
Plus for a sport mobile device added desirable qualities of;
1. Lightweight, small, tough, and bullet proof (able to withstand abuse dropping, bumping around, and so on).
2. Weather and waterproof.
3. Aesthetically pleasing as the components are worn by the user
In looking at the prior art in the near field area for wireless communication in WIPO publication 97/23060 to White et al., disclosed is an apparatus for bidirectional data and unidirectional power transmission between master and slave units using inductive coupling. In White, there is a base unit being the master that is used with a number of pieces for the slave unit that sits on top of the base unit wherein this particular application is for toys, thus with a consistent base unit various cartoon characters could be placed upon the base unit, with the cartoon character could have physical actions or voice output wirelessly transmitted from the base. In White, the means for data transmission are RF in addition to power being transmitted through induction from the base (active-master) to the cartoon character (passive-slave).
Continuing in the hand gesturing signal prior art in United States Patent Application Number 2016/0320847 to Coleman, et al., disclosed a method for modifying an audio parameter based on a gesture, the method comprising: acquiring sensor data associated with a hand of a user; analyzing the sensor data to determine at least one hand position; detecting a hand gesture based on the at least one hand position; in response to the hand gesture, modifying a spatial audio parameter associated with an audio stream to generate a modified audio stream; and causing the modified audio stream to be reproduced for output to the user. Thus Coleman is a gesture learning method only for far field wireless being at several feet of distance wherein Coleman does not teach hardware/software specifics on how the method is enabled.
Continuing in the near field wireless prior art in U.S. Pat. No. 7,523,012 to Shah, et al. disclosed is a method for controlling a mode of operation of a handheld electronic device, the method comprising the steps of: determining whether the handheld electronic device is docked in a holster, wherein the holster is movably coupled to a swivel that allows the holster to be rotated about an axis of the swivel. Shah then measuring a first magnetic field density using Hall sensors corresponding to an angular position of the swivel with respect to the holster when the handheld electronic device is docked in the holster; and generating a signal to change the mode of operation of the handheld electronic device due to the angular position of the swivel based on the measured first magnetic field density. Like Coleman, Shah is only a method and solely teaches a cursory content on hardware/software, Shah's principal application is for a mobile device holster that is limited to magnetic sensor activation.
Further in the optical sensing prior art in U.S. Pat. No. 9,432,113 to Matas disclosed a method comprising: by a computing device, receiving sensor data from a sensor on the computing device indicating physical movement of the computing device over a period of time; by the computing device, determining, based on the sensor data, two contemporaneous signals comprising: a motion-trigger signal corresponding to a first characteristic of the physical movement of the computing device; and a motion-confirm signal corresponding to a second characteristic of the physical movement of the computing device.
In Matas, in the computing device determining whether: the motion-trigger signal comprises a transition from within a pre-defined threshold band to outside of the pre-defined threshold band, wherein the pre-defined threshold band comprises a range of physical movement along the first characteristic and the second characteristic; and the motion-confirm signal is within the pre-defined threshold band; by the computing device, when the motion-trigger signal comprises the transition from within the pre-defined threshold band to outside of the pre-defined threshold band and the motion-confirm signal is within the pre-defined threshold band.
Thus Matas initiating a pre-defined action of the computing device, wherein the pre-defined action is associated with the first characteristic and not associated with the second characteristic; and by the computing device, when the motion-trigger signal comprises the transition from within the pre-defined threshold band to outside of the pre-defined threshold band and the motion-confirm signal is outside the pre-defined threshold band, preventing initiation of the pre-defined action. The novelty in Matas is in the dual switch system with optical intensity adjustment.
Next, in the close range wireless arts in United States Patent Application Number 2015/0140934 to Abdurrahman et al., discloses a system comprising: a body-wearable user device including a user device wireless transceiver configured to communicate directly with a secondary device wireless transceiver associated with a secondary device; a sensor configured to sense a physical motion of at least one of the user device and a body part of a user of the user device and output a signal based on the physical motion.
Further included in Abdurrahman is a processor that is communicatively coupled to the user device wireless transceiver and the sensor, configured, based on the output from the sensor, to: cause the user device wireless transceiver to transmit to the secondary device wireless transceiver a pair signal according to a first wireless modality; complete a wireless pairing between the user device wireless transceiver and the secondary device wireless transceiver according to a second wireless modality different than the first wireless modality. The device is typically wrist mounted in Abdurrahman and responds to hand and finger motions, see FIGS. 7A, 7B, 8A, 8B, 8C, 9A, 9B, 9C, 10A, 10B, 10C, and 11, and would not be considered to be near field in nature, it would seem that the generic hand gestures would result in unintended commands to the system.
Further, in the motion command prior art in United States Patent Application Number 2011/0007035 to Shai disclosed is a finger-worn user input device which includes a first stationary section adapted to fit on a human hand finger and comprising: a) a first rotatable section at least partially overlapping the first section and adapted to rotate and tilt relative to the first section; and b) an indication mechanism for relaying an indication corresponding to a relative position obtained between the first stationary section and the first rotatable section. In Shai, basically two finger rings are used to indicate relative position to one another, for energy harvesting, and other more general applications.
What is needed is a lightweight, compact, portable, and aesthetically pleasing UI system that accommodates the mobile sport device user that is designed to work outdoors in wet or dry weather, hot or cold weather, bright sunlight or night time darkness, and further accommodating user wearing gloves, coats, helmets, goggles, and the like, plus without the user having to pay no more attention to their command than a moment in time for their specific command to produce a desired mobile device output. The desired UI system would also be capable of multiple selected user commands that correlate to multiple desired mobile device outputs.
Sample applications would be for the mobile device of a MP3 music player wherein the desired outputs would include but not be limited to; volume up and down, music track forward or backward, mute on and off, channel, song, or playlist change, all while the mobile device is deeply buried within for instance a coat pocket-being safely protected from the outdoor elements. Further, sample UI user inputs would include but not be limited to hand swipes movement in the X, Y, and Z axes, i.e. laterally, vertically, and in/out, also circular movement (clockwise & counter clockwise), or even movement event sequences such as a lateral movement followed by a circular movement in close time succession.
Further desirably, UI system features would be such that a standard mobile device could be utilized that a user typically already possesses, wherein the major component of the present invention system would be a transceiver that can of course wirelessly sense the gloved hand movement of the user for instance and convert that specific user gloved hand movement into a specific electrical communication to the standard mobile device that will in turn result in the desired mobile device change of state, i.e., lowering volume.